When Jordie Barrett touches down in Chicago this week to link up with the All Blacks as an apprentice on their end-of-year tour, he will do so as one of the most accomplished age-grade rugby players on the planet. Over the past six months, the nineteen-year-old has been the stand-out performer in a New Zealand U20 side whose fifth place finish in June belied its talent level, played a key role in Canterbury’s thirteenth National Provincial Championship (clocking the most NPC minutes of any U19-eligible player in the last five seasons) and signed his first Super Rugby contract with the Hurricanes. Exposure to the All Black environment over the coming weeks will accelerate his development both on and off the field, and with regular opportunities in Super Rugby early in 2017 he could begin to make a claim for a place in the playing squad sooner rather than later.

Graphs plotting ave. no. of passes & offloads/80 mins against % of passes resulting in an assist of a line break or try for players with > 240 mins played – (i) excluding scrum-halves, (ii) scrum-halves only: